Peter Norton is a pioneer in the personal computer field. He wrote programs that solved a lot of problems with the early Disk Operating System (DOS) that came on personal computers. I can still remember the day that I thought I had totally trashed my hard drive (the first time) and a neighbor that came to the rescue with a Norton program. After doing everything I could think of, Disk Doctor repaired the problem and made my computer work again.

Peter Norton wrote programs that scanned the hard drive for potential failures, optimized the drive for faster access to programs, and generally fixed problems before they actually became problems. Microsoft actually licensed some of his programs to add to Windows, although they stripped out some of the functionality. And then Symantec came along and bought him out.

A lot of people regard Symantec's programs to be the best, because they carry the Norton name. Another group of people regard the Symantec programs to be inferior to the original Norton programs, and choose not to use them. Their claims are bolstered by Microsoft articles like Symantec Norton Anti-Virus 2001 Is Not Compatible with Windows XP and Cannot Use Word as Your E-Mail Editor with Symantec Norton AntiVirus.

So what is wrong with Norton now? I believe that their attempts to do everything for everyone has made their products too complex, and too open to problems. The original Norton Utilities were separate, discreet programs with a common interface - kind of like having a remote control that works only with your TV and VCR, instead of trying to handle your stereo and DVD Player and other more with one remote. It can get very complicated and confusing. The Symantec programs are all sharing more than just the initial screen, and they are more prone to problems. If one part messes up, all of the parts mess up.